The Unforgettable Nihal Jayamanne

Time and tide waits for no man. It has been one year since Nihal Jayamanne PC, eminent and senior counsel, a past president of the Bar, a well-loved personality, and a wonderful man, passed away. He is deeply missed, by friends, colleagues and juniors at the Bar, but none so much as by family for whom he was the light that shone brightly. Though the lamp is out, its warmth remains with love and fond memories of times gone by.

Nihal Michael Jayamanne, uncle Nihal to me, came into my life when I was but a toddler. At the time, he was an apprentice of Mr. Samuel J. Kadiragamar QC, and he would bunk his apprentice time with Mr. Kadiragamar at Queens road and walk over to my grandfather’s house to court my aunt Rohini who then was a science undergraduate at the Colombo University and had been introduced to him by his brother who was at the same Faculty at that time. They married and enjoyed 49 plus years of life together, till death parted them. She was the wind beneath his wings.

Uncle Nihal was a man of many parts; witty, intelligent, sporty, kind and compassionate, interested in the arts, and above all, a man who could relate to all persons in society, young and old. In this respect he was indeed a man who could walk with kings and not lose the common touch.

In the early days I remember him as a really fun character who would relate entertaining stories. I also enjoyed going about with him as he had a spanking new Peugeot which he drove very fast. Among my many childhood memories of him is that he bought me my first TinTin book. I was so hooked on to it that I persuaded my father to walk with me to the book shop at the Dasa building at Bagatalle road to buy the rest of the series.

As I grew older he would chastise me saying that I belonged to a generation that watched television and did not read enough. On his many visits to our house where he would wait after court to pick up my aunt from work, he would challenge me to take a broader view of life, embracing all faiths and points of view. He introduced me to the Desiderata and would stress one of its phrases; “…listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story”.

I was also encouraged by him to read Fritjof Capra’s “Tao of Physics” about the dance of sub atomic particles, and to see how that compared to the Hindu view of the Universe. As a teenager I was fascinated by this man, my uncle, who was a lawyer by profession but knew all these other things about science, nature, the arts and humanities – he would ask me to look up things like the Chandrasekhar Mass which is the critical mass of black holes and how this Nobel prize winning theory had been developed by Chandrasekhar an Indian while on his way by ship to England to accept a scholarship at Cambridge University.

Uncle Nihal did this for two reasons; not only to get me thinking but also to emphasize that it is we in the east who were responsible for some of the most interesting ideas that have come about. His varied interests were reflected in the art and artefacts he collected. Starting out as a cabinet of curiosities, in later years his whole house began to resemble a museum and art gallery with all manner of things and works of art. Mr. K. Kanag- Isvaran PC, his good friend of many years paying tribute to him at the unveiling of his bust at the Colombo Law Library recently, mentioned that it was rare to have a man with all these varied talents and drew attention to the fact that uncle Nihal had donated a valuable statue of Nataraja from his collection of artifacts to a Hindu temple at which the statue is presently venerated.

Nowadays one often hears of appeals to help small vendors on the basis that it is “an act of charity wrapped in dignity”. I learned this from uncle Nihal many years ago before it became fashionable to call it that. During my school holidays he would invite me to join him to go to outstation courts. He had no juniors then, and I read his briefs aloud for him in the car as he drove to refresh his memory.

On the way back he would often stop on a by-road to buy something that a little boy or girl was selling, not because he needed it but to help them. He would say; “do you know how hard they work to make that thing. You have it easy, they use that money to buy books”. Not only that, he would stop and chat with them, and per chance if they were playing a game, join in it too. As part of my scout activities when I was learning to identify trees by their leaves uncle Nihal would point out that any of these village boys or girls that we met on our travels could do that effortlessly.

He himself was very fond of nature and took a special interest in trees, planting various large trees on his family’s property. He was very happy to see them grow and bloom. In this respect he was creating carbon credits and was ahead of his time. Another fashionable phrase in the modern world is “be here now”; this too I learned observing uncle Nihal, not by reading books. He lived life in the present, was focused and enjoyed the moment. Positive thinking came naturally to him, so much so that whenever I was in a difficult situation I would ask myself; what would uncle Nihal do if he was in my place. I told this to him when he himself was very ill later in life. His positive thinking and that of his supportive wife and son Tilanka who left no stone unturned to find the medical attention required, enabled him to successfully survive a double lung transplant.

All who knew him as an adult knew him to be extroverted; he joked and laughed and enjoyed engaging with other people. A vivid memory I have, is of him dancing the tango with a rose between his teeth on December 31 to usher in the Millennium. Charles Spencer Chaplin said that a day in which one does not laugh is a day wasted. Uncle Nihal did not waste a single day, he laughed, joked and smiled every day that I knew him. His mother however, used to recall and tell us that he was not always like that and that as a child he was a shy boy; something we found very hard to believe!

Born to Bernadette (Bernie) and Senator J.M. Jayamanne, he was the second in the family and their first son. His siblings are Joan an elder sister who is an Attorney at Law and Bandula (Bandu) his younger brother who is a Chemistry Honours graduate. Uncle Nihal, schooled at St. Joseph’s College, was a Senior Prefect and captained the Tennis team. Recalling his school days, he would tell me what a great man Fr. Peter Pillai, the Rector of St. Josephs was and how he had a plethora of multi-disciplinary qualifications. Perhaps Uncle Nihal got his inspiration for his wide spectrum of interests from Fr. Pillai.

He took to law, and his leadership skills were recognized even at the Law College where he was elected President of the Law Student’s Union. Despite his father being a very successful lawyer in his time, a Senator and Minister of Justice, uncle Nihal chose to walk the path of his legal career on his own with no senior; starting at the very bottom. His success was all his own having built up a civil practice in the outstation courts at Homagama and Gampaha and thereafter in Colombo, both in the original and appellate courts. He appeared in many high profile cases and was held in very high esteem by the Bench and the Bar.

From a young age he was a member of the Law Commission which is charged with looking into amendments of the law. He went on to be its Chairman and was responsible for proposing many useful amendments to both substantive and procedural laws.

He was successively elected as President of the Bar Association. During his tenure as President of the Bar, on the suggestion of Judge C.G. Weeramantry who was the then Vice President of the International Court of Justice, he initiated the “Law Week”; a program for the Bar to interact with the pubic and solve their issues. This event has thereafter been successfully held annually.

Uncle Nihal’s reputation was not restricted to the Bar of Sri Lanka, he was elected deputy President of SAARC Law, President SAARC Law – Sri Lanka Chapter, and I was pleasantly surprised to find him on the Board of Trustees of the SAARC Law Centre of a leading Indian University which I visited. The Commercial world not only sought his counsel but wanted him to be on several Boards, most notably he was the Chairman of Seylan Bank.

At the peak of his career, he was diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis in his lungs. Being the positive thinker that he was, he continued working though given two years to live post diagnosis. We did not see any difference in him, attributing his tiredness to overwork. When this condition came to its peak he was very fortunate to have come across a compatible donor thereby enabling him to have a double lung transplant – the first time such a surgery was performed in Sri Lanka. The average life span of a person with such a transplant is five years post-surgery, Uncle Nihal’s positive thinking and supportive family enabled him to double that and live a decade thereafter.

He used that time well, to be with family, pursue his interests and watch his son Tilanka who graduated in law get married to Lydia, an Attorney at Law. In that time, he also returned to practice and completed 50 years at the Bar – a feat most practicing lawyers look forward to celebrating, because it is not an easy milestone to reach not only due to its professional rigour, but also because one has to live that long to celebrate it. We were all glad he made it to that point; I have on the mantelpiece a photograph of the two of us in celebration of that event, which I will continue to treasure.

The next milestone he looked forward to was his golden wedding anniversary in October 2022. Coincidentally, my uncle and aunt got married on my birthday and it was indeed something that we all would have liked to celebrate. Alas it was not to be, he passed away on June 14, 2022 after a brief illness, four months short of that anniversary. He was a good man, who lived a good life and was fortunate to have a loving family that enjoyed life with him.

Little known to the wider world was that in addition to his painting skills, he had an excellent voice and enjoyed singing Dean Martin, Sinatra and Nat King Cole songs and even recorded some of them. A senior member of the Bar having learned of this stopped me recently in the Supreme Court and asked me, “when are you going to give me a CD of your uncle’s songs” to which I replied that it is on You Tube and could be down loaded.

‘Unforgettable’ by Nat King Cole was one of his favorite renditions. The words of that song express the emotion and thoughts of all of us who knew him well. Nihal Jayamanne will remain;

“Unforgettable in every way,
And forever more, that’s how [he] will stay”.

Rajiv Goonetilleke
Deputy Solicitor General